I'm sure there are many ways of going about open source project management. Here is mine:
I mainly write tools dealing with games and game related file formats (used for mod creation, amongst other things), and some programs on the side regarding audiovisual analysis.
While some may find the release early, release often model to work, it's too incomplete for me and I don't use it myself. What I do is:
Do some research, grab some documentation
Write the program to be fully functional, commenting the functions along the way
Release the code along with the program once it is finished and thoroughly tested
Sit back and see if any users are experiencing difficulties or come across bugs, and release the new version of the binary and source code with the fixes/changes
In short, I believe in releasing complete, stable software, and providing the source for it if anyone wants to expand it or see how a certain part is done. And, going along with Crawford's issue with OOorg, a thing like that will not pop up -- because the program wouldn't be released half-finished (let alone be in it's third version!).
This isn't a troll but I will point out a few things that I find odd with your post.
Firstly, I'm sure there is a good reason as to why DRM exists at all, and why these laws that we all find dumb are being passed.
A few that come to mind are...
Big corporations corrupting politicians even further
This is a no-brainer really. What a better way to ensure your survival than to simply pay off a politician to try to pass a law?
Big corporations like Sony, Microsoft, and so on have lots of money that they can spend to make sure that the customer stays locked in,
and as obvious as my post seems so far, I think this gets lost in translating between bullshit and facts.
Unfortunately I cannot believe some of the laws they apply for. It's laughable because they should be minding their own business and not
attempting to pass a law that they have no clue about, but they are too busy exchanging laws and money with corporations to care about things
like common sense, logic, and what have you.
Sadly I've no idea what will become of this, but as long as there are politicians, there will be a problem. At the moment, I don't have a solution either.
DRM is a way to control people, not content
It's quite clear to all of us from all these torrent websites, and the warez scene that dates back to the 1980s in general, as to why they are still alive.
The companies that produce things like software, movies, audio, et cetera, aren't stupid. They KNOW their content is getting pirated, and reading a story a few
weeks ago, they are using it as a metric to find out how popular their content is. Instead, I think they are trying to control people themselves, to make sure
that no one else except them can dictate how that content is viewed. I mean, look at Sony for example -- you need a Blu-Ray player to watch Blu-Ray movies.
Yes, seems like a duh type of thing, but it's a pretty good lock-in.
Companies want to see how much shit they can get away with
This is one of my favorite ones to date. You see a company doing something stupid and you just know they are testing the grounds to see how much shit they can get away with.
Awhile ago, Rogers, a Canadian ISP inserted ads into the HTTP stream before the site loaded, so you would see an overlay of Yahoo! on Google. Who the fuck, honestly?
Laws are no different, in my opinion. When you want to pass a ridiculous law, you apply for it, and then you wait to see what was disagreed on. While some of the points
may get rejected, some of the other ones will remain, and then you strip the law of the ones that got rejected, and apply for again. Rinse and repeat.
However, on the flip side...
"Consumers" are at fault as well
Firstly, for letting yourselves be called that. Secondly, for not caring about your rights as citizens, not just customers. And thirdly, because you let the people who
represent you and who you pay to be where they are today fuck you over by the three points I've already stated. I'm sure posting on Digg and Slashdot and saying "Fuck Bush",
"Ron Paul's the answer, now what's the question?", and "Obama-nation" is great and all, but it doesn't really solve anything. You are stuck with what you have because you refuse
to act with something more than just a keyboard. Voicing your opinion is one thing, changing laws and defending The Constitution is another. I'm sure politicians laugh at all the
protests anyway. They are being paid off, and you helped them get to their position.
You have your rights, content makers have theirs
This is where my post meets the parent. I laugh whenever I see on Slashdot someone saying how they use Bittorrent to just download Linux distributions. That's a great way
to act like a politician. It's bullshit, and you know it. While I am not one of these so called "content makers," I do pity them regarding what Bitt
I'm a bit tired so pardon my rambling. I tried to make this post as coherent as possible.
I wonder if all these sites are bringing this issue to light to rake in more revenue through advertising a "hot topic"(TM). But let's game something straight:
Corruption in game journalism (if you can even call it that) is nothing new. I am disgusted because I cannot believe it's being brought up now, at this very moment, AFTER someone has been fired. That is to say, after something has happened which, *gasp*, shatters a gamers wild imagination that in a world controlled by money, game reviews are as well.
I've had a run-in with GameSpot a few years ago as well. I should have posted as AC but fuck it; bottom line is: GameSpot threatened to lower reviews because of an incident regarding a game who's demo was launched before their official premier. Yeah, it's a rather sad state of affairs. I've hated GameSpot ever since, but it seems like people were locked in to GS because it seemed like the only good place to get reviews -- that is to say, they didn't give a shit about my little story.
Well, I hope they realize it now, because it seems - a lot - of people dislike companies doing what companies do: try to stay alive.
It's rather obvious, but I do find it laughable. Honestly, GameSpot's website was covered in ads for a few years now -- and you are only bringing it's "corruption" to light NOW? What kind of a sick joke is this? Of course they are going to be paid off by game companies, they have ads all over their websites for christs sake. It's their source of income and they will do anything to defend it.
Including firing an employee, which I'm sure you're all familiar to companies doing, all the time. I wonder why this is any different.
Anyway, I didn't even bother reading the article (who would?) because it's clear it doesn't tell us anything new. It's the same old mindless rambling meant to rake in the dollars.
Speaking of which, today IGN posted their 100 Top Games List (or so I am led to believe it was today). I love their strategy: 1 game per page, 100 pages, and each one is full of ads. Have fun clicking the "next page" link guys!
Slashdot Mirror
I mainly write tools dealing with games and game related file formats (used for mod creation, amongst other things), and some programs on the side regarding audiovisual analysis.
While some may find the release early, release often model to work, it's too incomplete for me and I don't use it myself. What I do is:
- Do some research, grab some documentation
- Write the program to be fully functional, commenting the functions along the way
- Release the code along with the program once it is finished and thoroughly tested
- Sit back and see if any users are experiencing difficulties or come across bugs, and release the new version of the binary and source code with the fixes/changes
In short, I believe in releasing complete, stable software, and providing the source for it if anyone wants to expand it or see how a certain part is done. And, going along with Crawford's issue with OOorg, a thing like that will not pop up -- because the program wouldn't be released half-finished (let alone be in it's third version!).This isn't a troll but I will point out a few things that I find odd with your post.
Firstly, I'm sure there is a good reason as to why DRM exists at all, and why these laws that we all find dumb are being passed.
A few that come to mind are...
Big corporations corrupting politicians even further
This is a no-brainer really. What a better way to ensure your survival than to simply pay off a politician to try to pass a law?
Big corporations like Sony, Microsoft, and so on have lots of money that they can spend to make sure that the customer stays locked in,
and as obvious as my post seems so far, I think this gets lost in translating between bullshit and facts.
Unfortunately I cannot believe some of the laws they apply for. It's laughable because they should be minding their own business and not
attempting to pass a law that they have no clue about, but they are too busy exchanging laws and money with corporations to care about things
like common sense, logic, and what have you.
Sadly I've no idea what will become of this, but as long as there are politicians, there will be a problem. At the moment, I don't have a solution either.
DRM is a way to control people, not content
It's quite clear to all of us from all these torrent websites, and the warez scene that dates back to the 1980s in general, as to why they are still alive.
The companies that produce things like software, movies, audio, et cetera, aren't stupid. They KNOW their content is getting pirated, and reading a story a few
weeks ago, they are using it as a metric to find out how popular their content is. Instead, I think they are trying to control people themselves, to make sure
that no one else except them can dictate how that content is viewed. I mean, look at Sony for example -- you need a Blu-Ray player to watch Blu-Ray movies.
Yes, seems like a duh type of thing, but it's a pretty good lock-in.
Companies want to see how much shit they can get away with
This is one of my favorite ones to date. You see a company doing something stupid and you just know they are testing the grounds to see how much shit they can get away with.
Awhile ago, Rogers, a Canadian ISP inserted ads into the HTTP stream before the site loaded, so you would see an overlay of Yahoo! on Google. Who the fuck, honestly?
Laws are no different, in my opinion. When you want to pass a ridiculous law, you apply for it, and then you wait to see what was disagreed on. While some of the points
may get rejected, some of the other ones will remain, and then you strip the law of the ones that got rejected, and apply for again. Rinse and repeat.
However, on the flip side...
"Consumers" are at fault as well
Firstly, for letting yourselves be called that. Secondly, for not caring about your rights as citizens, not just customers. And thirdly, because you let the people who
represent you and who you pay to be where they are today fuck you over by the three points I've already stated. I'm sure posting on Digg and Slashdot and saying "Fuck Bush",
"Ron Paul's the answer, now what's the question?", and "Obama-nation" is great and all, but it doesn't really solve anything. You are stuck with what you have because you refuse
to act with something more than just a keyboard. Voicing your opinion is one thing, changing laws and defending The Constitution is another. I'm sure politicians laugh at all the
protests anyway. They are being paid off, and you helped them get to their position.
You have your rights, content makers have theirs
This is where my post meets the parent. I laugh whenever I see on Slashdot someone saying how they use Bittorrent to just download Linux distributions. That's a great way
to act like a politician. It's bullshit, and you know it. While I am not one of these so called "content makers," I do pity them regarding what Bitt
I'm a bit tired so pardon my rambling. I tried to make this post as coherent as possible.
I wonder if all these sites are bringing this issue to light to rake in more revenue through advertising a "hot topic"(TM). But let's game something straight:
Corruption in game journalism (if you can even call it that) is nothing new. I am disgusted because I cannot believe it's being brought up now, at this very moment, AFTER someone has been fired. That is to say, after something has happened which, *gasp*, shatters a gamers wild imagination that in a world controlled by money, game reviews are as well.
I've had a run-in with GameSpot a few years ago as well. I should have posted as AC but fuck it; bottom line is: GameSpot threatened to lower reviews because of an incident regarding a game who's demo was launched before their official premier. Yeah, it's a rather sad state of affairs. I've hated GameSpot ever since, but it seems like people were locked in to GS because it seemed like the only good place to get reviews -- that is to say, they didn't give a shit about my little story.
Well, I hope they realize it now, because it seems - a lot - of people dislike companies doing what companies do: try to stay alive.
It's rather obvious, but I do find it laughable. Honestly, GameSpot's website was covered in ads for a few years now -- and you are only bringing it's "corruption" to light NOW? What kind of a sick joke is this? Of course they are going to be paid off by game companies, they have ads all over their websites for christs sake. It's their source of income and they will do anything to defend it.
Including firing an employee, which I'm sure you're all familiar to companies doing, all the time. I wonder why this is any different.
Anyway, I didn't even bother reading the article (who would?) because it's clear it doesn't tell us anything new. It's the same old mindless rambling meant to rake in the dollars.
Speaking of which, today IGN posted their 100 Top Games List (or so I am led to believe it was today). I love their strategy: 1 game per page, 100 pages, and each one is full of ads. Have fun clicking the "next page" link guys!